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Everyone, who eats them, can reccommend a place that serves the very best beef burgers. Naturally, most people have their own favourites. So, it would seem that there are many places that serve the ‘very best burgers’. I havetried a few of these highly reccommended places and have with one exception (Gourmet Burger Kitchen – a chain that originated in New Zealand) been disappointed. Most ‘very best burgers’ turn out to be ok (usually) but an anti-climax (mostly).

Now, I am going to seem very conceited. That is because I believe that I make the ‘very best burgers’ myself in our home, and so should you. My recipe is dead simple. I take minced beef with a lowish fat content (10% or less), add a pinch of salt and a small spoon of oil (sunflower or olive) and, after washing my hands, mush the three ingredients together before hand shaping patties of the sizes preferred by those who will eat them. Then, I cook them on a griddle. That’s all. No egg or breadcrumbs are added. Try this for yourself and you will no longer be wasting your money on overpriced, mediochre burgers.

Almost wherever you go in India, you are bound to see the statue of a man wearing spectacles with round lens frames and a suit. He is always carrying a large book under his left arm. These statues depict Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, who was born in Mhow (now Dr Ambedkar Nagar in Madhya Pradesh) in 1891, son of an Indian army officer. He died in New Delhi in 1956. This remarkable man was a jurist, economist, politician and social reformer. He was a founding father of the Republic of India and helped formulate the Indian Constitution. He is best known for his work on promoting the rights of the ‘dalits’ (‘untouchables’) and reducing discrimination against them.

Ambedkar was awarded a doctorate by Columbia University (USA) in 1927, and another by the London School of Economics (‘LSE’) in 1922. He was called to the London Bar in 1922 as a member of Gray’s Inn. Later, he was awarded further degrees by Columbia University and Osmania University (in Hyderabad, India).

Between 1920 and 1922 while he was studying at the LSE and for the Bar, Ambedkar lived in a house at 10 King Henrys Road near Chalk Farm in north-west London. In 2015, the house was bought by the Government of Maharashtra and was then converted into a memorial to Ambedkar. It is open to the public. Visitors can learn about Ambedkar from the well-captioned photographs on the wall of the rooms that they can wander through. The upper floor contains a re-construction of Ambedkar’s bedroom including a four-poster bed, some of the great man’s books, and an old pair of spectacles, which might have belonged to him. Other rooms contain shelves of books and various memorials to Ambedkar. There is also a commemorative plaque to India’s present Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who inaugurated the memorial house in November 2015. The garden contains a typical statue of the type I have described above.

Sadly, this monument to such a great man is under threat. Some local residents have been complaining that it is annoying to have a museum amidst their overpriced bourgeois residences (see: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-49411985 ). Camden Council, in whose borough the Ambedkar house is located, are to decide on its fate at a hearing to be held in September 2019. I hope that the (racist???) objecting residents of King Henry’s Road will not be permitted to help to erase the memory of a truly great man’s stay in London.

Back in 1983, I visited Bulgaria. I had been advised that it was very unwise to exchange currency in the country any other way than by using the state’s official foreign exchange desks. So, as soon as I disembarked at the railway station at Sofia, I changed some of my UK Pounds into Bulgarian Leva. Even at the official exchange rate, one Pound had a more than adequate spending power.

My friend and I took a taxi to the city centre. When we arrived, the meter , I asked the driver how much we needed to pay. He answered:

“One Deutschmark, One Dollar, One Swiss Franc, or one Pound.”

I said that I wanted to pay in Bulgarian Leva. He said:

“Two Leva”

But, I protested:

“The meter says only one Leva”

The driver turned around and said:

“Two people: two Leva”

I repeat this true tale to emphasise how little local money was valued in comparison with so-called ‘hard currency’. Also, in a few months when the UK leaves the European Union, probably without a trade deal, the Pound, which is already sinking in value, might cease to be a hard currency. Who knows, but here in the UK we might prefer to be paid not in our own currency but in one of the harder currencies such as the US Dollar or the Euro.

While looking for something to eat on the train between Cambridge and London, I spotted a sandwich in a colourful wrapping (illustrated above). It was a ‘LGBT’ sandwich containing Lettuce, Guacamole, Bacon, and Tomato. Well, the initials ‘LGBT’ usually refer to ‘lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender’. The colours of the sandwich’s wrapping are those associated with the LGBT ‘community’.

I wondered whether M&S, the suppliers of this colourfully wrapped sandwich were:

trying to appeal to LGBT customers

trying to be ‘politically correct’

both of the above

neither 1 nor 2

having a laugh at the expense of the LGBT ‘community’

or, all of the above

Who knows? I did not buy this sandwich, but selected a similar one, the BLT, which lacks guacamole.

Many of us have great faith in reviews of artistic events such as film, theatre, and other performances. Can one trust professional critics and reviewers? Do their tastes match yours? If they do not and you follow their reccommendation, you must be prepared for an anti-climax.

This patient of mine was a local school teacher. An educated person, you would imagine.

One rainy afternoon he sat on my dental chair. Then, I reclined it so that he was lying almost horizontal: his head and mouth at one end of the chair and his feet at least five and a half feet from his mouth. I administered the local anaesthetic, waited for anaesthesia to become established, and then repaired the teacher’s decayed molar tooth with a silver amalgam ‘filling’. When the procedure was over, the teacher left my surgery apparently quite content.

An hour or so later, the teacher returned to our practice and asked the receptionist to allow him to speak to me. He entered my surgery and pointed to a mark on one of his brown suede shoes.

“I believe that you must have dropped some of your chemicals on my shoe while you were treating me,” he said.

I looked at the mark and quickly realised that this fellow was hoping to be compensated, possibly for a sufficient to buy a new pair of shoes.

“Unlikely,” I replied, “while I was treating you, you were lying horizontally. Your mouth was a long way from your feet. If I had dropped something, it would not have fallen anywhere near your feet.”

“Mmmmh,” he replied.

“Furthermore,” I added, “it’s been raining heavily all afternoon. Maybe, you picked up that mark while walking along the wet streets.”

The teacher left, and I heard no more about the problem with his footwear. I was left thinking what an unintelligent man he was, and that somebody had qualified as being capable of teaching young people.

You can walk almost anywhere except on water when it is not frozen. And, the joy of this form of physical activity is that no special equipment is needed.

During the first few decades of my life, I used to walk long distances routinely. I would never wait for a bus, but would walk from stop to stop until the bus and I met in the same place. Then, I might have boarded it unless I was close to my destination. Today, I am lazier, and will wait for the bus.

Walking (without staring at a mobile telephone) is a wonderful way of seeing new things. You might walk the same route repeatedly but if you keep your eyes and mind open, you are bound to spot things that you never noticed before.

In recent years, I have begun writing books, articles, and, now, blogs. I often find that leaving my work desk, switching off the PC, and then taking a walk is perfect for sorting out my ideas. As I walk along, thoughts circulate in my mind and these result in improvements in whatever I am writing.

Apart from any medical benefits, using Shank’s Pony (moving along with one’s own two feet – walking) gives me great pleasure.

A few years ago, we hired a mini-cab (a type of taxi) to take us from Kensington to Golders Green. When we entered the cab, we heard music being played on the car’s cassette player. It sounded Russian to me. I asked the driver about it and he confirmed that it was Russian. He told us that he was from Afghanistan and had lived in Russia for a couple of years before settling in London. We began chatting as we drove northwards towards Golders Green. He told us that during the day he sold shoes in his own shop and drove his cab in the evening. We engaged in an amicable conversation.

When we arrived at our destination, I asked how much we owed him. He said:

“Nothing at all.”

“But, we must pay you something,” I said.

“No, nothing. You are my friend. I cannot ask you to pay me,” he explained.

For a few moments, I was flummoxed, at a loss as how to proceed. On the one hand, he said he did not want to be paid. On the other, he had done a good job for us, which needed rewarding. Then, I said to him, handing over a £10 note:

“If we can’t pay you, take this as a present for your children.”

He accepted the money without objection. £10 was the normal fare for that journey in those days.

We booked another mini-cab for our return journey. By coincidence, it was driven by someone from Afghanistan. Although he was not as friendly as the outward bound driver, there was nothing to complain about him. When we arrived at our home, we asked him how much we owed. He answered:

“Anything you like.”

I paid him the £10, which we usually pid for that journey, and the driver was happy with that.

Shortly before that day of Afghan mini-cab drivers, I had finished reading a book about travelling in Afghanistan., An Unexpected Light: Travels in Afghanistan by Jason Elliott. In it, he describes shopping in rural Afghanistan. The customer is not quoted a price, but has to make an offer. If the offer is too low, the seller will look insulted and hurt. If it is too high, everyone else in the shop will laugh at the customer. I suspect that it was on this basis that the two mini-cab drivers operated with us. They must have detected our familiarity with eastern ways and customs. Had we been typical Anglo Saxon customers, they might have simply quoted a price.